| July 16, 2003 | Wednesday | Jumadi-ul-Awwal 15, 1424 |
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Mines of abuse
Left to suffer & die
PAKISTAN’S judicial system, its organization, its services and administration suffer from many problems and shortcomings. Some of these are avoidable. But many, such as shortages of judges, courthouses, equipment, poor salaries of judges and lack of professionalism in many cases have arisen because of the chronic inadequacy of the needed resources, both financial and technical. As a result, not only access to justice is virtually denied in many cases for reasons of cost, delays and inefficiency that afflict the process, but even those who are in a position to access it with a little effort suffer grossly from the inordinate delays and uncertainties that occur in the course of its dispensation. All this has led to a situation where successive governments have found it almost impossible to streamline the system and make it more responsive to the demand for speedy justice. Even commercial contracts have been rendered meaningless by the twists and turns in the legal and judicial processes. Because of this reason alone Pakistan has been denied its expected share in foreign investment as foreign investors do not like to operate in a market where their investment is not provided with adequate legal cover. The same explains the shyness of local capitalists to invest their money in business enterprises. One aspect of the malaise is that the law-abiding citizens avoid the courts like plague itself while law breakers fear them the least. To make things worse, the members of the bar and the judicial officers are now locked in an unending political battle over the recent extension in the judges’ retiring age.
It is against this backdrop that one must view and welcome the decision of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to provide Pakistan with a generous technical assistance amounting to $350 million for judicial reforms. Under this assistance, a number of pilot projects are being taken in hand for institutional capacity building in preparation for access to justice programme (AJP) which is to be financed by AJP fund comprising an endowment of $25 million. Accordingly, a comprehensive review of the judicial statistics has already been completed and a plan to professionalize the working of the courts has been prepared. Meanwhile, the law commission has been expanded and empowered to take up the responsibility of coordinating the administration of justice. Also, the existing inspection system is being strengthened to improve the capacity of the high courts of each province to monitor the performance of the courts. As many as 1,100 computers are to be made available to improve operational efficiency of the judicial system. According to reports, in just eight months pilot judges improved performance by increasing their disposal of cases by almost 250 per cent.
The ADB had at first allocated about $130 million for judicial reforms in Pakistan. But after 9/11, the amount was increased to $350 million. According to the schedule given in the MoU signed between Pakistan and the ADB, the entire amount should have been disbursed by June 2003. However, so far Pakistan has utilized only about $150 million. One hopes that the agencies responsible for implementing these reforms would speed up their operations and try to complete the ADB project at the earliest so that the people of the country as well as prospective investors feel increasingly confident about the reliability and efficiency of the country’s legal and judicial systems.
PARTICIPANTS in an NGO-sponsored seminar, held in Islamabad the other day, revealed the inhuman conditions prevailing in Pakistan’s mining industry. According to the details, bonded and child labour, as well as child abuse, are rampant in this labour-intensive sector. This is despite the fact that the abhorrent practices are prohibited by law. One of the delegates to the seminar, who had carried out a survey of various mines in the country, revealed that 80-85 per cent of the mine workers were untrained, they lived in pathetic conditions, and were made to do bonded labour. Children, who transport coal and other mined material on donkey carts from the mines to the market, are widely abused — both physically and sexually. Most of the bonded workers come from impoverished rural areas, who are loaned a few thousand rupees by agents and then made to work in bondage for seven to ten years — which is the average working life of a typical mine worker shortened by ill health resulting from working and living in inhuman conditions.
Mine workers have to endure long work hours, toiling under unsafe working conditions, wearing no protective gear, and a complete lack of proper health or housing facilities. As a result, a majority of mine workers suffers from skin and chest diseases and tuberculosis. The survey in question concludes by saying that conditions prevailing in the privately-owned mines in all the four provinces are much worse when compared with the government-owned mines. All this, in spite of Pakistan being a signatory to the International Labour Convention and has a labour department, whose inspectors are supposed to enforce labour laws and ensure proper and safe working conditions in the country’s mines. It is time the authorities concerned took notice of these inhuman practices and took firm steps to enforce the existing labour laws and initiate criminal proceedings against the violators so as to check the evils of child and bonded labour and child abuse.
ACCORDING to a report, a senior official associated with the government’s AIDS control programme has admitted that the government spends practically nothing on providing medicines for patients suffering from the HIV virus. Multilateral donors, particularly the World Bank, are the primary sources of funding for the country’s anti-AIDS effort with the bulk of the funds going towards creating awareness about the disease. This happens because Pakistan’s total reported cases do not make it eligible for receiving donor funding for treatment of patients and purchase of medicines. This, though, should not mean that the government does nothing to relieve the distress of AIDS victims. Regrettably, the federal government has shown considerable apathy by not coming forward to finance medicines for AIDS patients. With no known cure, they have little by way of hope except medicines that can either ease its symptoms or delay the onset of full-blown AIDS. Except in South Africa and a handful of other developing countries whose political leaders took a stand against multinational pharmaceuticals, AIDS medicines are extremely expensive and it would be inconceivable that common patients in Pakistan can afford these on their own.
One wonders how the government can possibly justify its decision not to provide subsidized medicines to patients. If the excuse is lack of funds then it is a poor one. The consequences of such an indifferent approach cannot be overlooked, especially since our social taboos and lack of testing facilities mean that the actual number of AIDS cases may be much higher than is acknowledged. Just because donors cannot provide the necessary funding to enable us to look after our AIDS sufferers does not mean that they should be left to their tragic fate. Those who suffer from this disease should be treated as human beings and provided subsidized medicines and treatment — and not shunned. Equally vital is the need to strengthen AIDS prevention efforts through more intensive public awareness campaigns.